Windmill Wwoofing

Join me as I travel across the Netherlands while working on farms

Final days on the farm (and in the Netherlands!)

I’m back in Evanston now (arrived on Wednesday), but wanted to write two last blogs to close out my trip. This one will be short, and will cover my last two full days on the farm, my trip to the airport, and any little things I forgot to mention from my time on the Cornelissen farm. On my next blog, I’ll take a step back to think about my experience in the Netherlands as a whole. I’ll also make a few of the ranking lists I’ve alluded to in previous blogs.

By these last two days on the farm, it was clear that we were running out of projects to do. When there are not wwoofers on the farm, Bert and Manon prioritize running the most essential farm operations (ie feeding animals or planting crops). With me on the farm, we worked on projects they would get to eventually, but were easier with an extra set of hands. I forgot to mention one of the bigger projects I worked on last week: weeding in the canal.

This photo was taken after I cut down all of the weeds. These weren’t your average backyard weeds through – most of them were 2-3 feet tall. Some looked more like little trees (I wasn’t exactly sure what they were), and others resembled rhubarb plants. The rhubarb plants were super smelly when you cut them. These two types of weeds stretched across the entire length of the canal on both sides (about 200 ft long I’d guess), and were quite dense in some areas. To get me in the best position to cut them all down, I was given waders. These waders were interesting because the boots were directly attached to the legs of the overalls. Unfortunately (maybe for you, but not for me) I didn’t take any photos of me in the waders (I didn’t want to get my phone wet while I worked), but feel free to use your imagination again. The waders were definitely necessary; even though the canal was only 2 feet deep at the most, I splashed around and sometimes fell in while trudging through the grass. Cutting down all of the weeds took about 4 hours.

Jumping back to the present week, Bert and I resumed our job pruning trees. While it felt like we accomplished a lot in our first effort pruning, standing far away from the trees we worked on revealed modest visible differences from before we started. We also only worked on 2 trees, and there were at least 10 in the orchard. I got more comfortable working high up in the trees this time, and realized I felt more stable if I abandoned the ladder and climbed up into the sturdy trees.

This first tree was a bit harder to get up into because of all of the shrubs surrounding the base. I tried to bring a bucket into the tree with me to collect all of the branches I cut off, but this quickly proved futile (the branches were too long to fit in the bucket, and it grabbing branches as I cut them slowed me down significantly). I ended up letting the branches fall onto the shrubs, and did my best to collect them all after I finished pruning from my perch.

The branch cleanup process was much easier for the next tree I worked on. Not only were there no shrubs around the base of the tree, but the sheep were also grazing in that area, and were more than happy to eat the leaves off of the branches I felled.

They knocked over the wheelbarrow

I got concerned whenever they bunched around my ladder and bumped into it, but they never knocked it over. Sometimes they took breaks from munching the leaves to lie down and rest; it was a sweltering 75ºF day after all (maybe hot for them in their wool coats, but I for one appreciated the warmer weather). It was really nice to have more consistently nice weather, but a shame it didn’t begin until the end of my trip.

Another project we worked on was weeding the field around the potatoes we had planted. These weeds were very small, and were not too difficult to get out using the tool I was given (apparently it’s called a stirrup hoe according to google).

There was still more room in the field to plant crops, but we did not plant anything on these last two days. Usually we had to wait to plant because the fields were too wet, but this time Manon stopped us because her calendar told it us was not the right time to plan. This was not your typical planting calendar, but instead a cosmic planting calendar. Apparently using cosmic indicators to decide when to plant crops is an integral part of “biodynamic” farming. Biodynamic farms incorporate the same principals as organic farming (ie not using pesticides), but add on the additional step of consulting celestial bodies.

Let me be clear, I don’t believe in any of this. I was immediately skeptical when Manon showed me the calendar, and was ready to volley a barrage of questions her way (Who made this calendar? Do you have any proof that it improves outcomes for the plants? Why does Jupiter’s position influence potatoes? Why doesn’t Jupiter influence cucumbers, it seems more like a squash planet to me…). I’m not even sure if The whole thing just seems quite arbitrary to me, and weird that something as mystical as astrology is being translated into quite a cut and dry approach to farming (plant this crop at this time). All of this being said, I did not ask any of my questions to show my skepticism. While a pseudoscience, the astrology wasn’t hurting anyone or anything. It did no harm in following the calendar, and I can’t imagine planting potatoes on a Tuesday makes much difference from planting them on a Wednesday. I tried to my best to be satisfied with the rationale for why we wouldn’t plant, but was honestly just happy to have less work.

Burt’s beekeeping group (no affiliation with Burt’s Bees, at least I assume) was coming back the day after I left, and Bert wanted me to help put together gifts for them. Inside the raised plant beds, there were hundreds of little herbs growing (I forgot the name) that attracted bees. He wanted to put 10 plants into each box as party favors for all of the guests he would host the next day. So that is exactly what I did.

On the day I left the farm, I headed out at 5:30 am. I caught a bus just before 6, and made it in time for a 6:30 am train from Meppel. This worked out very well (with planning beforehand of course) because that train would directly take me to Schiphol Airport in only an hour and a half’s time. For those curious, the train was not just the farm to airport express. The train started in Leeuwarden in the very far north of the country and snaked its way through Zwolle, Amsterdam, and Schiphol (among other stops) before reaching its terminus at The Hague. Even though the train visits big cities, it’s nice that it also stops at smaller stations along the way, providing frequent transit between the rural and urban regions of the country. Of course the main station at Schiphol is built directly into the airport itself, not across a highway (looking at you, Oakland), making sure a very easy trip. The station is very convenient to get to because it serves as a hub for trains, rather than the end of a spoke like many other airport train stations are. It’s not like you have to take a train from the airport back to Amsterdam to get anywhere, trains frequently pass through on their way to Rotterdam, Utrecht, and the rest of the country.

While the train station at Schiphol is nice, the airport itself is just fine. It’s quite a large airport, and not the easiest to navigate. I had no problem getting to my gate, but wanted to visit the Star Alliance Lounge to get free food and write a blog before I got on my flight. Unfortunately I never made it there, since I ultimately figured out the lounge was in a different terminal with its own customs entrance. I would have had to enter and exit a separate customs checkpoint area to reach the lounge and make it back to my gate, which wouldn’t be worth it (if it was even allowed) because the line was so long. I ended up sitting at a cafe (with crappy coffee, but anywhere in the airport would have been the same) and bad wifi that prevented me from getting that blog post done before the flight (it was the Giethoorn post, I ended up posting it from Evanston). I also stopped by some touristy shops to get rid of the last 25 euros I was carrying; I bought two small wheels of cheese and a shot glass (I’ve been buying them at the airports for all of the places I visit).

You don’t even have to leave the airport to find cheese and tulips

I managed to watch 4 movies on the flight – I usually tire out around 3. Quick roundup of the films: Next Goal Wins was short but cute; I usually like anything Taika Waititi puts out. The movie was a documentary (with a few liberties taken) about American Samoa’s infamous soccer team (they lost 31-0 in WC qualifiers to Australia at one point). The Hangover is a classic, but I had not seen it yet. Got a few good laughs in. The Boys in the Boat is based off Daniel James Brown’s book about the University of Washington rise to compete in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. I read the book a while ago and really enjoyed it, but heard the movie wasn’t good. I actually thought the movie was pretty good (and had better pacing than the book). It was far from a great movie, but I think it did the book justice. Finally I watched The Big Short, which I’ve heard lots of great things about. I enjoyed it; it really does show how messed up the financial industry is: even if you’ve done something correctly, the larger players will do anything to cover up your success.

The aforementioned and infamous United Airlines stroopwafel (much worse than the ones you can buy in Dutch supermarkets)

Stay tuned for the next (and final) blog.

Dogs fall asleep in the most uncomfortable looking positions

Even Dutch birds use clogs

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